All-Ireland Senior Hurling Championship semi-final: Tipperary v Galway (Sunday, 3.30pm, Croke Park, live on RTÉ 1 & Sky Sports 3)
THEY are the two most criticised teams in Ireland, according to Tipperary captain Brendan Maher.
By 5pm on Sunday, the harvest will be looking up for one of them, but that has been the case in five of the last seven Augusts. Neither of them has found a way to bring Liam MacCarthy home in September since Lar Corbett’s hat-trick against Kilkenny six-years-ago.
The loser in Croke Park on Sunday will face the same stinging criticism as meets their every Championship exit. That’s just the way it is for this pair. For Galway, having bared their teeth against Clare, it would be particularly disappointing as they strive to draw a bridge back to their last All-Ireland in 1988.
Ger Loughnane labelling them “gutless” did his native county no favours, inciting a performance from Galway that deservedly took out the league champions. It puts them back on the same path as the Munster champions, who have a vengeance of their own to seek this weekend.
Seamus Callanan began one of the all-time great individual performances in Croke Park with a goal inside 36 seconds, Padraig Mannion smashing the first hurl of the day in vain trying to stop him. The Tipperary full-forward went on to collect 3-9, leaving Mannion in tatters, but there was still no place in the final for him as Shane Moloney’s winning score settled an epic contest.
And despite the gutsy manner of Galway’s win over Clare, it’s Tipperary who will arrive beneath the Hogan Stand as favourites to face the winners of Saturday afternoon’s replay between Waterford and Kilkenny. Their Munster final performance bore hallmarks of their famous 2011 win over the Déise, when they hit 7-19 to claim the provincial title.
Five years on, they reopened the same wounds on Waterford in mid-July, hitting 5-19 on this occasion on an afternoon that threatens yet to bring hurling out of its sweeper-induced coma. Waterford came out of their shell against Kilkenny and it so nearly paid off last Sunday. Such shells have never suited Tipperary though, back to the afternoon Liam Sheedy tried to get Lar Corbett to mark Tommy Walsh in 2012.
It was an alien concept in a land of tradition and it was costly. None have meddled like that since. Their directness, and the ruthlessness that comes with it, remains their biggest strength. They saw Tadhg dé Burca in the space in front of their full-forward line in that Munster final and they simply bypassed him in the air.
With the breeze at his back, Darren Gleeson parked the short puckout in favour of going very, very long. He left the ball right on top of the Waterford full-back line and wreaked havoc doing so. Goals for John McGrath and Michael Breen came off those puckouts, sucking the soul from Derek McGrath’s men, who collapsed to a 21-point mauling.
Their directness was what gave Seamus Callanan the supply off which to score 3-9 off the Galway full-back line last autumn. There may be an air of predictability around it, but knowing it’s coming and stopping it tearing you up are two very different things.
That they dismantled the sport’s most refined defensive system has placed the spotlight firmly on Tipperary’s heads. Galway won’t mind that. But so long as their nemeses Kilkenny remain, that all-too-familiar second-half dwindle in the Leinster final will remain placed above any of their victories in the analysis of Michéal Donoghue’s men. That loss offered a harbour for the critics. Anthony Daly said: “Some of the ringleaders that got Anthony Cunningham out couldn’t get it done again yesterday.”
Sharing a boat with the Mayo footballers, having thrown their captains overboard in winter, has been a rocky sail, but they are both in the last-four of their respective competitions. The signs are they will not allow Callanan to own the square the way he did last year. The deployment of Aidan Harte as a sweeper against Clare, even with the wind, provided Galway with stability.
Playing Daithi Burke in the full-back line that afternoon suggests Padraig Mannion may be relieved of duty at number three. Callanan would thrive on the first hint of weakness were that battle to be renewed. To take the eyes off John and Noel McGrath would surely render the end of Galway’s hopes as well, but they will be confident enough in their own forward line causing Tipperary equal bother.
Cathal Mannion’s best of the year was against Kilkenny, while Conor Cooney has been chipping in with three or four points a game. Perception would suggest they are so reliant on Joe Canning, but the stats say different - he has scored 31 per cent of Galway’s total this season, compared to the 40 per cent of Tipp’s quota that has come from the stick of Callanan.
The experience of last year will provide as much solace for Galway as it will motivation for Michael Ryan’s men. Their Munster success - the manner of it, more than anything - edges Tipperary into pole position on the grid.
Tipp by a head.
PATHS TO THE FINAL
TIPPERARY
Munster quarter-final, May 22: Tipperary 0-22 Cork 0-13; Munster semi-final, June 19: Tipperary 3-22 Limerick 1-15; Munster final, July 10: Tipperary 5-19 Waterford 0-13
GALWAY
Leinster quarter-final, June 5: Westmeath 0-19 Galway 3-27; Leinster semi-final, June 19: Offaly 2-9 Galway 2-19; Leinster final, July 3: Kilkenny 1-26 Galway 0-22; All-Ireland quarter-final, July 24: Clare 0-17 Galway 2-17
